Exercises: Style is Matter
by lovetiffy
Summary: Easing into writing with prompts collected from the Internet, as well as the recesses of my mind. Starts with cliches and hopefully goes somewhere from there...
1. Chapter 1: Let's Go Home

**Hand over your heart / Let's go home**  
**"Cold Desert," Kings of Leon**

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His hands gripped me by the waist, pulling me closer. I stumbled.

"So funny," he murmured. His eyes, glassy and green and deeper than a forest, pierced my own dull brown.

"What?" I managed, my body humming sweetly at the nearness of his.

"I'm the one s'posed to be drunk," he mumbled. "But here you are, falling all over the place."

I blushed, feeling sheepish. I wanted to say something, but I couldn't, I couldn't – my throat was too dry, he was standing too close, his skin was too warm, his mouth was too pink. His gaze was now burning a trail across my skin.

I stopped breathing.

His green left my brown, searched my face, lingered on my lips (I licked nervously; his eyes darkened). Long, careful fingers followed, traveling my collarbones, tracing protruding bones, feather-light and achingly soft.

I shivered. My heart danced in my chest, wanting to fly out of my ribcage and take residence in the spaces beneath his shirt.

"Bella," he whispered, dragging his eyes back up to mine.

All else turned to white noise, the backdrop to a voice that could bring angels to their knees.

"Edward..."

"Let's go home."


	2. Chapter 2: Dig Up the Dead

My goodness, it's been a while... I wrote this a few months ago. There's mention of self-harm, so _trigger warning_. Please approach with caution. Thank you for reading. Until next time...

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**My eyelids falling down / All my dreams in black and white**  
**I see so clearly now / I'll never get it right**

I smell her blood from miles away, know she is breaking her skin, all those cells parting like the Red Sea. She always tells me to stay away, for her sake almost as much as mine.

My girl. Bella. Bella. Bella. Bull-headed and beautiful and strong. Her name spins off my tongue like webs and lace. She likes that – the webs, the dark, the strange and unexplored. I once asked her if that was where my appeal lay. Dark, handsome, brooding vampire and all. If anything is strange and unexplored, I said, it's monsters such as myself. She laughed and told me to quit thinking so highly of myself. Words dripping in sarcasm.

I would never say it to her face, but sometimes I wish she'd be the one to think more highly of herself. She treats blades like pencils, marking up her body as though it's a piece of paper. Scars all over her arms and legs and hips.

"It's therapeutic, Edward," she explains. "I'm in control. Everything disappears except for this."

She apologizes for putting me in this position. "Why don't you take the day off? Go hunting with Jasper or Emmett. I know how sensitive you are with–"

"It's not the blood, Bella. I can handle the blood. It's everything else that makes me feel unhinged."

She opens her mouth to interrupt, but I continue, "I do everything I can to keep you away from harm, and here you are, running up to greet it like it's an old friend. I don't know how I'm supposed to stand by and watch you do this..."

"I'm not asking you to stand by and watch me do anything."

"Bella."

_"Edward."_

She is just as exasperated as I am. We are both tired of this fight, and neither one of us is willing to budge.

To me this is black and white. Self-harm is bad. Blood is not an option. Knives are for culinary use. Razors, for shaving. Love is good. Love is enough. Love can do anything. Love can heal. But with Bella, everything is in shades.

I lie back on my bed and stare up at the ceiling. It's late and Bella will be going to sleep soon. Her eyelids will flutter shut and, worn out, she'll be lost to the world in minutes. As for me, I will close my eyes, and I will block out everything but the nighttime sounds outside, and I will ignore the hairline cracks creeping into my faith in us until morning.

:::

What Edward doesn't understand about my bad habits is that they keep me breathing. He believes that cutting is death, that even a pinprick of blood is the equivalent of a suicide note. He doesn't understand that all my senses awaken from the moment I start scratching open my skin. I like the roses that bloom and the words that I carve onto my body. I tell him it's a lot like unzipping myself. I am opening up, letting myself be a little bit vulnerable for once, enjoying the feeling of being raw.


End file.
